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need some guys with block experience/ideas


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one of the bolts on top of the engine holding the block together is leaking oil. tigthened the bolt a little, it was already tight but i put 180 degrees on it and it seems to leak less....unless it was just a temperature or other unrelated cause in leaking less.

 

any ideas on this? could i remove the bolt and seal it somehow? seems like removing a bolt that holds the block together is a rediculous idea but i want to stop the leak.

 

the motor has never been apart that i know of (i know the previous owner) and runs well.

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so this is the reason for oil pooling on the block, I take it?
yep. i cleaned off the intake really well and noticed it after a 15 mile trip. tightened it and it seems to leak less, but still coming out. not being familiar with block work im not sure the best way to go about it.
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yep. i cleaned off the intake really well and noticed it after a 15 mile trip. tightened it and it seems to leak less, but still coming out. not being familiar with block work im not sure the best way to go about it.

 

I am also not familiar with block work but it seems like you could take that one bolt out (what could it hurt :brow:) and either teflon tape it, get a new bolt, or maybe even try sealing it with an o-ring? (if you wanna go ghetto, that is..)

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Could you post here a Photo of that?

 

If it is located away from the main oil / water passages, maybe the answer to this is to take out the bolt, put on it Teflon tape (on its thread) and put it again in its place...

 

...but it can be a high pressure bolt, so I suggest to post an image here... or try with teflon... (Teflon Tape is the one we use to seal threads of water pipes, it work well with high pressure, extremly hot water, etc... even I did repair a leakin´ brake line of an Old Datsun 1,600 Pick up, of 1972 that was of my dad, so it maybe can help you... )

 

 

Good Luck! :)

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i can post a picture later.

 

any concensus on pulling this bolt out and reinstalling it? i don't want to cause major engine issues on an engine that runs fine. concerned mostly with breaking the seal between the engine halves. i'd think it would stay to together just fine but i really don't know. heck...what's it going to do, cause a leak?

 

the bolt slides through one half (where it's leaking) and threads into the other half of the block holding them together. so i don't think teflon tape would work on the bolts "head" side of the block where mine is leaking since the tape would only seal the threaded portion on the other half of the block. an oring or some sealant would probably work on the shaft side though.

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the seal is actually at the meeting of the case halfs. You may be ably to pull out the bolt clean it and the hole well with brake/carb cleaner then use sealer in the hole and up by the bolt head. permatex ultra grey or black might work.

 

teflon tape is for tappered pipe threads only. I cannot recomend it for any straight thread sealing.

 

so yeah you may be able to stop or slow down you leak if you get lucky.

 

I learned another trick a while back.I dont know if it would work for you or not. you seal the pcv and crank case breathers and pull a vacume (with a shop vac) on your engine. apply RTV to cleaned area of leak and hopefully the vacume will pull the sealer into the gap. I only tried this one time and it did reduce the leak greatly but did not stop it completely.

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You may be ably to pull out the bolt clean it and the hole well with brake/carb cleaner then use sealer in the hole and up by the bolt head. permatex ultra grey or black might work.

any idea what my changes of incurring problems by doing this?

pull a vacume (with a shop vac) on your engine. apply RTV to cleaned area of leak and hopefully the vacume will pull the sealer into the gap.
that is awesome. that's worth a try just for the coolness factor! wonder if a shop vac pulls more vaccumm than my vaccuum puller? i bet it pulls much higher volume, mine is small for A/C stuff.
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well you already have a leak. guess you could still have a leak after sealing attempts.

I would guess the shop vac would work better as its hard to get a good seal on your motor to pull a vacume with a small high vacume pump.

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same thing happened to my ea82t recently....i thought it was typical of an old pig.to leak oil aswell..so i removed the turbo to get at the top rear main bolt and it was not tight enough in my opinion..so i took it out..cleaned it with thinners..the hole also..then air dry with a shop compresser..then put auto motive silicone on it and reinstalled it..did the same with the bottom one while i was there..and whammo...no more oil leaks..its been 750 miles since i did this and no dramma since..cheers

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did the same with the bottom one while i was there..and whammo...no more oil leaks..its been 750 miles since i did this and no dramma since..cheers
Awesome! thanks for posting! i'll give it a try.

 

how did you use the sealant? on the bolt head or the shank? i have a hard time believing the shank will completely seal. want to make sure i get it right the first time!

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You nee to think about why the bolt is leaking at the top of the engine. It sounds to me like yu have too high a crank case pressure, which would mean that you may have a bad cylinder. I recently installed an engine in my wifes car that I had completely resealed. Due to the better sealing and the fact that it had a bad cylinder,(Ididn't know it at the time) it startedd shooting oil out the dipstick.

 

Before you go any further I recommend a compression test on all four cylinders. They need to be within 10 percent of one another. If not, then you will get blow by and if you decided to seal this bolt you will get a leak somewhere else.

 

Good luck and I hope I'm wrong.

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Due to the better sealing and the
it's on 30,000 + miles after a head gasket/reseal job i did. you are probably on to something.

 

Before you go any further I recommend a compression test on all four cylinders.
(6 cylinders). i'm wondering why the blow by can't vent out the dipstick or PCV valve? i'll do a leak down test and verify.

 

i have a couple blocks, some brand new heads ready to go and a complete gasket set so i can throw an engine together. guess that will be a goal for the next couple months.

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  • 3 weeks later...

i tightened the bolt and it did slow down the leak considerably....but it was still leaking. and leaking from other places as well (like mjdc suggested it would, good call!)

 

i was using 10w-30 oil. i switched about a week ago to 20w-50 and it hasn't lost any oil since then. maybe it's due to something else and maybe i'll see oil loss shortly but it appears to have "gotten better".

 

i'm going to clean the engine and do a compression test and see what i get and how much it's leaking.

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Gary, there is a seal between the halves of the block. Can you post a pic? I will check my FSM's to see if it is in the same area.Thinner/thicker oil might start/stop leaks but it is just possible that the block sealant or o-ring need to be renewed.

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it's at the top of the block towards the front of the engine, the bolt head is on the passengers side. i know exactly what o-ring you're talking about, didn't think about that.

 

picture is no where to be found. i'm going to compression test and clean it off see where it leaks from after that.

 

now that i think about it, the oil dipstick always popping out leads me to believe it's blow-by as well.

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